BY Maryrose Wood

BASED ON A CONCEPT BY
THE Duchess of Northumberland

For Jane
and her wonderful gardens

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About the Author

Copyright

About the Publisher

1

15th March

Gray skies; the rain came and went all morning. A cold wind blew in gusts, worsening as the day went on, until the lowest branch of the great chestnut tree in the courtyard splintered down the middle and crashed to the ground. If I had been standing underneath, I would have been crushed.

Spun wool after breakfast. Read for a short while, but my eyes ached too much from sewing to continue long. Changed the soaking water for the belladonna seeds.

Father is still not home; it has been two days.

THE BERRIES OF THE BELLADONNA PLANT are beautiful. I have always thought so. I would string the plump black pearls on silk thread and wear them around my neck if they were not so deadly.

The seeds are nearly as poisonous as the berries; Father has warned me a thousand times. But I am careful. First I tie the seeds in clean muslin bags and drop them in a pail of cold water. Before they can be planted they must soak for at least two weeks, and I must change the water every day. That is how Mother Nature would do it: The snow would fall and melt and then fall again. And it would be too risky to leave the seeds in the ground during the cold months; they might get eaten by birds and carried away to grow in some distant field, where they could wreak their mischief without warning. Instead I make-believe a winter for them, to trick them into growing only when and where I wish.

Even after all that care, only a few seeds will sprout, and of those half will soon shrivel back into the dirt. Are you so in love with death, lovely lady? I call you lovely lady, for that is what “belladonna” means. You are curiously reluctant to be born. Is our world not beautiful enough for you? Or perhaps there is another, more perfect realm in which you prefer to dwell?

I laugh at myself now; what foolish imaginings! But when Father is away I must make do with whatever companions I can find: a sparrow on the windowsill, a shadow on the wall, or even a tiny, dangerous seed. We have lived alone here among the ruins for so long, Father and I, and he is away so much, and is so silent and lost in his own thoughts even when he is here, I sometimes worry I might lose my speaking voice completely from lack of use.

Let me test it.

“Hello.”

“Hello?”

Feh! I sound a frog. A tincture of lemon balm and anise would cure this broken voice of mine.

Or someone to talk to. That would do it, too.